“Ur-r-r-r-r-r-r!” cried Wynnette, with a shudder. “That accounts for my murderous instincts against Anglesea and other culprits. I inherit it through my mother—from all these vindictive old vampires.”
“Oh, Le! let us go away. I don’t like it. I don’t like it!” pleaded little Elva.
“No more do I,” said Rosemary.
“Stay,” said Le. “Here is something more about the place.” And he read:
“‘This trapdoor has not been opened for more than fifty years. Tradition says that early in the last century a groom in the service of the lords of Enderby secretly married my lady’s maid, and as secretly murdered her and threw her body, together with that of her infant, down the shaft, for which crimes he was tried, condemned, and executed, and afterward hung in chains outside the wall of Carlisle Castle. The trapdoor was ordered to be riveted down by the then ruling Lord of Enderby, and has never since been raised.’”
“Ur-r-r-r-r-r-r!” again muttered Wynnette. “That’s worse than the other.”
“Let us go away. Oh, I want to go away!” wailed Elva, trembling.
“Oh, please, please come away, Le,” pleaded Rosemary.
“Now just wait one moment, dears. You will not mind looking out of these windows, loopholes, or whatever they are, that open through the twelve-foot thickness of the outer wall. Great pyramids of Egypt, what mighty builders were these men of old!” exclaimed Wynnette, walking off toward the east side of the hall, where there were a row of windows six feet high and four feet wide on the inner side, but diminishing into mere slits on the outer side.
“Here the baron’s retainers could safely draw their bows and speed their arrows through these loopholes at the besiegers without,” said Wynnette, curiously examining the embrasures. “But, ah me, in times of peace what a dark hall for the dame and her maidens.”